(BFM Bourse) – The Paris index ended 2023 well. The CAC 40 had a great year in which it broke its records. On the value side, certain industrial groups such as Stellantis, Schneider Electric and Saint-Gobain shone.
“It was the last session,” I quote an Eddy Mitchell song. And the CAC 40 finally ended the year, this Friday, December 29, on a good note with a gain of 0.11% to 7,543.18 points.
As very often during the last session, the market had to face a certain calm. It rose sharply for most of the day, with the Paris index penalized a bit by Wall Street’s decline at the end of the session, with the S&P 500 down 0.5% shortly before the European close.
Elsewhere, the euro is expected to end the year above $1.10 and is expected to fall 0.05% to $1.1056 this Friday, shortly before the close in Europe. The oil nibbles away. Brent North Sea crude for March was up 0.7% at $77.66 a barrel, while February WTI was up 0.6% at $72.19 a barrel in New York. However, for the full year 2023, both contracts lost around 10% each, weighed down by concerns about China’s economy and the good performance of shale oil production in the United States.
>> Get access to our exclusive graphical analyzes and gain insight into the trading portfolio
New records in 2023
To return to 2023 and the CAC 40, the Paris index had a good year, eventually gaining 16.52%, although this increase remains far from the impressive recovery of 2021 (+28.85%). The CAC 40 GR with dividends reinvested in 2023 gained 20.14%.
The CAC 40 has broken all-time highs several times this year during the session (with a record 7,653.99 points on December 14) and at the close (7,596.1 points on December 15).
However, the year was not easy. The start of 2023 has turned out to be a tumultuous one, with a 9.4% jump in the month of January alone, thanks to hopes raised by China’s economic reopening, which has allowed luxury to post impressive stock market performances in the first months of the year. . But this Chinese recovery has actually been disappointing, plus China’s indexes have had a rough 2023 (the CSI 300, which combines large-caps Shenzhen and Shanghai, fell 11.4%). Luxury, on the other hand, lost its illusions in the second half of the year due to the normalization of demand. To illustrate, LVMH (+7.7% this year) will be lower than the CAC 40 in 2023.
In March, the bankruptcy of several regional American banks froze the entire banking sector and subsequently the markets. In Europe, Credit Suisse, the great Achilles heel of the old continent’s banking industry, faced massive withdrawals of deposits, which forced the Swiss authorities to push it into the arms of sister UBS. This helped end fears of contagion.
If the second part of 2023 was not marked by a major crisis, several large CAC 40 groups suffered in the autumn after issuing warnings about results or drastically reducing their forecasts (Alstom, Worldline, which left the CAC 40 in mid-December), respectively. it simply disappointed investors in the third quarter (Sanofi and to a much lesser extent LVMH).
Good business results
The fact remains that the CAC 40 has been supported by falling inflation on both sides of the Atlantic over the course of the year. So much so that markets began to expect significant cuts in key rates by the European Central Bank and the US Federal Reserve (Fed) in 2024, first by 125 basis points (1.25%) and from 175 points to 150 basis points in the second . This phenomenon triggered a year-end rally across all global markets.
Let’s also highlight the good quality of business results. To illustrate, more than two-thirds of the 38 companies in the index publishing half-yearly accounts corresponding to the first six months of 2023 saw net profits rise.
In a sign that market growth affected almost all sectors, 34 of the 40 stocks in the CAC 40 ended the year in the green.
Several industry groups are doing well. Driven by its sparkling results and impressive profitability (current operating margin of 14.4% and profit of 10.9 billion euros in the first half), Stellantis is finally reaching the stars, signing the strongest increase in the CAC 40 (+59% ). Carlos Tavares’ method of combining iron cost discipline and robust “price power” eventually seduced investors.
Saint-Gobain (+45.52%) and Publicis (+41.23%) were able to demonstrate the relevance of their transformation. First City strengthened in growth markets such as construction chemicals. The oldest company in the CAC 40 delighted the market with every publication in 2023. Publicis posted business growth that beat analysts several times, with Arthur Sadoun’s group gaining contracts and market share mainly due to its move into data analytics. Schneider Electric (+38.66%) is also having a good year and recently returned to the very exclusive club of CAC groups with a market capitalization of more than €100 billion.
L’Oréal (+34.95%) and Hermès (+32.55%) also performed well, while luxury suffered in the second half of the year. However, Hermès has lived up to its standards and never let the market down with each of its publications, which demonstrates the resilience of the saddler. L’Oréal suffered from China’s poor economy (and Beijing’s offensive against the gray market), but showed its ability to adapt by beating expectations in other regions of the world in the third quarter.
Let us also take this last session to wish you, dear readers, on behalf of all the BFM Bourse teams, a Happy New Year 2024.
(Note that we will return in an article to be published early Saturday morning on the big winners and losers of the SBF 120).
Here is the CAC 40 2023 rating variation
- Stellantis +59.23%
- Saint Gobain +46.02%
- Publicis +41.37%
- Schneider Electric +39.06%
- Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield +37.61%
- STMicroelectronics +37.13%
- Saffron +36.38%
- L’Oréal +35.09%
- Air Liquide +33.02%
- Hermès +32.79%
- Dassault Systemes +32.06%
- Crédit Agricole SA +30.73%
- Airbus +25.91%
- Legrand +25.77%
- Michelin +24.92%
- Vinci +21.88%
- Bouygues +21.68%
- Capgemini +21.03%
- Danone +19.20%
- Veolia +19.00%
- Engie +18.90%
- Renault +18.00%
- BNP Paribas + 17.54%
- Axa +13.18%
- Thales +12.28%
- Orange +11.02%
- Vivendi +8.55%
- LVMH +7.90%
- EssilorLuxottica +7.33%
- Edenred +6.41%
- Carrefour +5.91%
- Total Energy +5.03%
- Arcelormittal +4.48%
- Societe Generale +2.32%
- Sanofi -0.09%
- Eurofins -112.05%
- Pernod Ricard -13.06%
- Kering -16.09%
- Telepower -40.70%
- Alstom -46.63%
Julien Marion – ©2023 BFM Bourse